Cocteau, Jean | Carol A. Cujec (essay date fall 1996)
Carol A. Cujec (essay date fall 1996)
SOURCE: Cujec, Carol A. “Modernizing Antiquity: Jean Cocteau's Early Greek Adaptations.” Classical and Modern Literature: A Quarterly 17, no. 1 (fall 1996): 45-56.
[In the following essay, Cujec asserts that Cocteau's early classical adaptations—Antigone, Oedipus-Rex, Oedipe-Roi—are “bold avant-garde experiments reflecting the radical revision of the theater by modernist innovators of the era.”]
Following his initial productions of avant-garde ballet, Jean Cocteau sought to confirm his capabilities as a serious dramatist by turning to classical subject matter. Cocteau's interest in the classics was encouraged by his companion Raymond Radiguet who declared: “Il faut éctire … comme tout le monde.”1 By “tout le monde,” he was not referring to the popular boulevard authors nor to the overly-fashionable avant-garde, but rather to the celebrated authors of Western...
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